Three Days
by sassafrasss
Summary: Based off the Musical. Elphaba is up late, and Scarecrow Fiyero knows why. Shes unsettled that Fiyero doesn't like being a scarecrow, though he hides it well. ONESHOT!


Three days. It had been three days since it all ended. Oz celebrated, and the Wicked Witch of the West sighed in relief, along with a certain Scarecrow. Few cried, in fact, only one did, Glinda the Good Witch. She cried for her best friend's death, and the loss of her infatuation. Three days since the fateful day Dorothy had poured a bucket of nasty, gritty, and stinky mop water onto Elphaba. She then, using her skill in magic, pretended to melt. Of course, this was merely a magic trick, completely unlike her real magic. She ended up hiding under her floorboards shivering, looking up at her treasured pointed hat, hoping they wouldn't take it. Of course, everyone was afraid to poke it with a ten foot pole. She had waited there, and she watched Fiyero, Boq, the goddamn stupid Lion she had saved, and the bitch who stole her dead sisters shoes (Who does that?!?) walk away. Glinda, too, left. The guards were convinced that she had been kidnapped by Elphaba, when Elphaba in reality couldn't make her go away, and had shoved her in a closet instead. Glinda had tried, really, to tell them that she wasn't truly Wicked, but they passed it off as temporary insanity.

And so… she waited. Elphaba had waited under the floorboards for hours. Then, finally, the soft clumping of Fiyero's straw feet came back. He lifted up the floorboards, to find Elphaba shivering, wet, cold, and dirty. He gently lifted her from the hole and shut it. Carrying Elphaba to bed, they simply slept, completely wiped out, and able to sleep somewhat soundly, for the first time in a long while. Elphaba woke a few times, covered in a cold sweat, scared of the cruel guards' faces, and the wizard's sly glare. She fell back to sleep at the sight of the scarecrow next to her.

It was early morning, around eight-o-clock, three days after all that jazz. Fiyero awoke with a yawn spread across his cloth face. He sighed, and turned over, his eyelids half opened sleepily to look at Elphaba. They opened all the way as he found she wasn't there. He hadn't remembered her coming to bed… so had she come at all? Fiyero pursed his lips in disappointment as he got out of bed quickly. He didn't need to worry about bathing, dressing, body odor, or brushing his teeth. They came with the package. He stopped in the mirror and arranged his straw hair more fashionably. Elphaba had helped him cut it, and it would always stay the way they had cut it. It was just another perk. Fiyero smiled, he liked looking on the good sides of his new life.

Fiyero quickly walked through the halls of the Castle. There was no dirty corner of the castle, for Elphaba liked things clean, though where she had the time to do so was a mystery to Fiyero. He turned the corner and ran up the spiral staircase to Elphaba's private study. He knew just where she was and exactly what she was doing. Fiyero opened the thick wooden door at the top and strode in.

The speech of harsh and disciplining words he had prepared completely disappeared at the sight of her. She was bent over her thick magic book, The Gemmerie, which she never seemed to finish reading, as though more words would appear. She had her customary black pointed hat, but it wasn't on her head. It was sitting by the book on the desk, next to her slender green hand. Her long, raven black locks were tucked behind her ears, as she looked down, trailing down the back of her black dress. Her gently curved nose matched her face perfectly, with her high cheekbones and soft, full red lips. Fiyero's brown eyes softened immediately.

A few strands of Elphaba's hair fell from behind her ear. Gently, her smooth green hand swept them back. Fiyero smiled softly. "Elphaba?" he called softly.

Elphaba looked up, her green eyes meeting his. There were dark circles beneath her eyes, and Fiyero frowned slightly. Elphaba smiled at him, making his frown dissipate. "Morning, love" she said, and turned her head back to her book.

Fiyero's frown returned. His speech came back. "You didn't come to bed last night." He said stiffly.

Elphaba looked up again, this time her green eyes were harder. One slender black eyebrow rose. "Yes?" she replied, matching his tone.

Fiyero narrowed his eyes slightly. "Come away from that book, Elphaba, I know what you are doing." He commanded in an exasperated voice.

That was the wrong thing to do. Glinda took commands easily, but Elphaba did whatever she wanted to do. Her eyes hardened further and she tensed up. "Fiyero, I need to fix it!" she said stiffly, "I know you are unsatisfied! That you want to be you again! You tell me otherwise, but I know you are lying…."

He tried to keep her gaze, but couldn't, and looked at the ground, hating himself for it. He knew she was right, too. Deep down, where he had buried it away, he was having doubts. It was obvious that if he had given up on Elphaba, he would be back to his normal, handsome self, living with Glinda in their expensive town home in the best neighborhood of the emerald city. He mentally kicked himself for bringing this thought up. He loved Elphaba, how do you just give up on that? He felt guilty for thinking Elphaba wouldn't notice. He also felt terrible for causing Elphaba to feel guilty for turning him into a scarecrow and staying up all night to search through her book to find a reverse spell.

He decided to try one last time. He gently walked around and bent down, latching his arms about her thin waist. He rested his chin upon her boney shoulder. "Hun, Elphaba, I don't care what I look like, or what I am, as long as I'm with you…" he whispered into her ear.

She wasn't buying it. Elphaba had a sarcastic expression upon her face. She plucked a piece of straw from her hair to prove her point. "Oh? Then why do I feel so terrible every time we kiss? Every time I feel that hesitation? Hmm?" she asked curtly, narrowing her eyes.

Fiyero stood up stiffly. He opened his mouth to say something, but she beat him to the punch.

"I knew it!" she cried, standing up, pointing a black fingernail at him, "You don't like being a scarecrow! I don't think anyone would be! Stop it! Stop lying! Stop lying and just let me fix it! Just let me fix it…."

Her sentence trailed off. She bent her head and her black hair flowed forward, covering her face, but not before Fiyero caught the tear that slid down her beautiful green face.

Feeling worse than ever, Fiyero naturally went forward and around the desk, bringing Elphaba into his embrace. He cradled her gently, cooing comforting noises to her as she gently sobbed on his shoulder. They stayed like that for a lost amount of time, for these tears weren't just over Fiyero as a scarecrow, but for everything. Through all her ordeals, she hadn't even shed a single tear. Now it all came out, all the emotion suppressed inside her, for that's what she had to do to be strong and tough. Now she let it all out, into the shoulder of her lover.

When Elphaba was reduced to sniffles, Fiyero moved her head from his shoulder. He gently wiped one last tear from her cheek and smiled. "Better?" he asked softly.

Elphaba nodded. She sniffed one last time before looking up at him with her doleful eyes. "Please?" she choked out.

Fiyero's eyes softened. "Okay" he whispered, "Okay, we'll do it together."

That made her smile. Elphaba gave a small laugh. "What do you know of magic?" she scoffed gently, the twinkle back in her eye.

Fiyero stood up straight. "Oh well… tons. I know that you wave a wand... and say some words and…" he looked at her, noticing she was watching him skeptically. Fiyero cleared his throat. "Well I was the one turned into the scarecrow; don't I get to participate on undoing it?"

She smiled, and broke their embrace, sashaying over to her desk briskly. "Okay, I have scoured the book for the spell I used the first time, but its gone, completely gone. So I then started looking for reversing incantations and…." She trailed on in a bunch of mumbo jumbo Fiyero didn't understand.

His brow furrowed, Fiyero looked over her shoulder at the book. He didn't understand it. Finally, after she recited he words she had used, Fiyero got an idea.

"Why not just say the words backwards?" he quipped in the middle of her sentence.

It made sense for Fiyero to think that reversing a spell was just reversing the words that caused it. Elphaba was about to guffaw at him when it struck her: No one had ever mentioned anything about simply saying the words backwards. She whipped back to her book and quickly paged through it, but found nothing there either. She frowned.

"Well?" asked Fiyero, raising his eyebrows in question.

"Well doing this would be very dangerous because we have no idea what would happen to you, or me for that matter, and we could even die." She said gravely.

"I vote we try it!" Fiyero said immediately. He did danger the best.

Elphaba sighed and looked at him. He was doing the puppy eyes. "Oz save me…" she mumbled, then louder, "Okay, but if you die, I'll strangle you in the afterlife."

Fiyero grinned like a brainless idiot, but the look in her eye told him she was serious.

He kept grinning.

* * *

Elphaba scanned the room. Her desk had been pushed back, everything condensed neatly in he corner. She sighed, remembering Chistery, who should be back with the other monkeys in around 4 days. She remembered what the wizard had said, 'You cannot reverse a spell that has been cast!' She flinched. Elphaba looked at Fiyero who was standing in the middle of the room, opposite her podium with the book was sitting upon it. Somehow, she had found the original spell, now she would read it backwards. Elphaba was scared.

"Fiyero?" she began softly, "If this doesn't work…I just-"

"Don't say it" Fiyero said, cutting her off.

"But-"

"Don't. I know what you're going to say, and I feel the same"

Elphaba sighed. "Okay."

Elphaba took her place behind the podium. She looked up one last time and met Fiyero's eyes. She gulped and looked down.

"NEMHAN AKELE MUTA MUTA NEMHAN NEMHAN AKELE" Elphaba chanted, "NEMHAN AKELE MUTA MUTA NEMHAN NEMHAN AKELE"

Smoke billowed around Fiyero suddenly. It was thick and black. It gagged Elphaba's throat. Suddenly the spell began to draw on her magic. She could feel it drain from her. She panicked, and almost cut it off.

Then she heard the screams.

They were just like when she had given the monkeys wings, but more human like, and these cut her heart in two, for they were Fiyero's.

"FIYERO!!!!"

She forgot about the uncontrollable drain coming from her, and ran towards the smoke. Fiyero was flailing about inside. Elphaba dove in from panic, only to be kicked back against her podium from Fiyero's flailing limbs.

She lay there, too tired to move now, but wishing to reach the screaming Fiyero desperately. Finally, the drain that sucked the life from her stopped with a sharp pain like someone had struck her in the gut. Elphaba doubled over and coughed.

Fiyero had stopped screaming, and yet the cloud of thick black smoke hung there. Elphaba slowly uncurled and began to crawl on her hands and knees towards her lover. Reaching into the smoke, Elphaba coughed again, tears streaming from her eyes. She searched through the smoke but she couldn't feel Fiyero anywhere, and the smoke was too thick to see through. In despair, Elphaba flopped over onto her side and curled into a ball, coughing and sobbing in alternative, convinced she had killed Fiyero.

Something touched her back. Elphaba flinched. A hand gently traced up to her waist. Elphaba stayed stiff and still. This wasn't a cloth glove filled with straw, but an actual hand.

Wrapped around her waist, the arm attached to this hand dragged her towards the body. There he was. Fiyero was also curled up in a ball, his face wet with tears, obvious pain in his face for every time he moved. Elphaba began to cry again for hurting Fiyero, but Fiyero smiled and pulled her close, in too much pain to do much else. They simply stayed there.

Fiyero's very much so made of skin hand gently curled around Elphaba's green one, and a smile bloomed upon her face as the smoke and haze, slowly drifted away.


End file.
